LOS ANGELES -- Every time Roki Sasaki has taken the mound lately, he has looked better and better. In turn, that has led the Dodgers to become comfortable with the idea of pushing him further.
"I think that we're getting to the point where he's earning a lot more leash," manager Dave Roberts said, "and rightfully so."
Given the opportunity to go deeper, Sasaki made the most of it, setting career highs with 10 strikeouts across seven scoreless innings before Freddie Freeman walked off the Angels, 1-0, on Friday night at Dodger Stadium.
Sasaki outdueled Angels starter Reid Detmers in a contest that was in a scoreless tie until the bottom of the ninth, when Freeman took former Dodger Kirby Yates deep for a walk-off blast to seal a series-opening victory.
Sasaki has dominated the Angels in two starts this season. He previously tossed seven innings of one-run ball last month in Anaheim.
At 24 years and 214 days old, Sasaki became the fourth-youngest Japanese-born pitcher to reach double-digit strikeouts in a Major League game, behind only Shohei Ohtani (twice in 2018, at 23 years and 277 days, 23 years and 312 days) and Kazuhito Tadano (2004, 24 years and 68 days).
The version of Sasaki that the Dodgers have seen lately has looked much more like the phenom who appeared set to take the Majors by storm ahead of the 2025 season after a brief but decorated career in Nippon Professional Baseball.
Since adding a new splitter to his repertoire on April 25, Sasaki has posted a 3.12 ERA (14 earned runs in 40 1/3 innings) through seven starts. In his last two starts, he's unlocked the triple-digit velocity that was his calling card in Japan, topping out at a career-high 100.6 mph on his fastball on Friday.